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Page. No, nor no where elfe but in your brain. Ford. Help to fearch my house this one time: if I find not what I feek, fhew no colour for my extremity, let me for ever be your table-sport; let them fay of me, As jealous as Ford, that fearch'd a hollow wall-nut for his wife's leman. Satisfy me once more, once more fearch with me.

Mrs. Ford. What hoa, miftrefs Page! come you,. and the old woman down; my husband will come into the chamber.

Ford. Old woman! what old woman's that?

Mrs. Ford. Why, it is my maid's aunt of Brentford.

Ford. A witch, a quean, an old cozening quean! Have I not forbid her my houfe? She comes of errands, does the ? We are fimple men; we do not know what's brought to pass under the profeffion of fortune-telling. She works by charms, by fpells, by the figure, and fuch daubery as this is: beyond our clement we know nothing.- Come down, you

witch; you hag you, come down, I say.

Mrs. Ford. Nay, good, fweet hufband;-good gentlemen, let him not ftrike the old woman.

Enter Falstaff in women's cloaths, led by Mrs. Pege. Mrs. Page. Come, mother Prat, come, give me your hand.

Ford. I'll prat her:-Out of my doors, you witch! [Beats him.] you hag, you baggage, you poulcat,

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his wife's leman.] Leman, i.e. lover, is derived from leef, Dutch, beloved, and man. STEEVENS.

3 She works by charms, &c.] Concerning fome old woman of Brentford, there are feveral ballads; among the reft, Julian of Brentford's laft Will and Teftament, 1599. STEEVENS.

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fuch daubery] Dauberies are difguifes. So, in K. Lear, Edgar fays: "I cannot daub it further.”

STEEVENS.

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you' ronyon! out! out! I'll conjure you, I'll for tune-tell you. [Exit Fal. Mrs. Page. Are you not afham'd? I think, you have kill'd the poor woman.

Mrs. Ford. Nay, he will do it :-'Tis a goodly cre dit for you.

Ford. Hang her, witch!

Eva. By yea and no, I think, the 'oman is a witch indeed: I like not when a 'omans has a great peard'; ? I fpy a great peard under his muffler.

Ford. Will you follow, gentlemen? I beseech you, follow; fee but the iffue of my jealoufy: if I cry out thus upon no trail, never truft me when Lopen again.

5 ronyon!] Ronyon, applied to a woman, means, as far as can be traced, much the fame with fcall or fcab spoken of a man. JOHNSON.

So, in Macbeth:

"Aroint thee witch, the rump-fed ronyon cries." From Rogneux, Fr. So again: "The roynifh clown," in As you like it. STEEVENS.

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—a great peard;

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-] One of the marks of a supposed witch, was a beard. So in Macbeth:

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-you should be women,

"And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
"That you are fo."

Again, in the Duke's Miftrefs, 1638:

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-a chin, without all controverfy, good "To go a fishing with; a witches beard on't."

STEEVENS.

Ifpy a great peard under his muffler.] As the fecond ftratagem, by which Falstaff escapes, is much the groffer of the two, I wish it had been practifed first. It is very unlikely that Ford, having been fo deceived before, and knowing that he had been deceived, would fuffer him to efcape in fo flight a difguife.

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JOHNSON.

-cry out thus upon no trail,-] The expreffion is taken from the hunters. Trail is the fcent left by the paffage of the game. To cry out, is to open or bark. JOHNSON.

So, in Hamlet:

"How chearfully on the falfe trail they cry:

"Oh this is counter, ye false Danish dogs!" STEEVENS,

Page

Page. Let's obey his humour a little further: Come, gentlemen. [Exeunt. Mrs. Page. Trust me, he beat him moft pitifully. Mrs. Ford. Nay, by the mafs, that he did not; he beat him most unpitifully, methought.

Mrs. Page. I'll have the cudgel hallow'd, and hung o'er the altar; it hath done meritorious fervice.

Mrs. Ford. What think you? may we, with the warrant of woman-hood, and the witnefs of a good confcience, purfue him with any further

revenge? Mrs. Page. The fpirit of wantonnefs is, fure, fcar'd out of him; if the devil have him not in fee-fimple, with fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the way of wafte, attempt us again".

Mrs. Ford. Shall we tell our hufbands how we have ferved him?

Mrs. Page. Yea, by all means; if it be but to fcrape the figures out of your husband's brains. If they can find in their hearts, the poor unvirtuous fat knight fhall be any further afflicted, we two will be ftill the minifters.

Mrs. Ford. I'll warrant, they'll have him publickly fham'd: and, methinks, there would be no period' to the jeft, fhould he not be publickly fham'd.

Mrs. Page. Come, to the forge with it then, fhape it: I would not have things cool. [Exeunt.

9 in the way of wafte, attempt us again.] i. e. he will not make further attempts to ruin us, by corrupting our virtue, and deftroying our reputation STEEVENS.

-no period- -] Shakespeare feems, by no period, to mean, no proper catastrophe. Of this Hanmer was fo well perfuaded, that he thinks it neceflary to read-no right period. STEEVENS.

VOL. I.

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SCENE

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Bard. Sir, the Germans defire to have three of your horfes the duke himself will be to-morrow at court, and they are going to meet him.

Hoft. What duke fhould that be, comes fo fecretly? I hear not of him in the court: let me fpeak with the gentlemen; they speak English?

Bard. Sir, I'll call them to you.

Hoft. They fhall have my horfes; but I'll make them pay, I'll fauce them: they have had my houses a week at command; I have turn'd away my other guests: they must come off; I'll fauce them; comc.

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[Exeunt. SCENE

they muft COME off;-] This never can be our poet's or his hoft's meaning. To come off being, in other terms, to go feetfree. We must read, cOMPT off, i. e. clear their reckoning. WARBURTON.

To come off, fignifies, in our author, fometimes, to be uttered with fpirit and volubility. In this place it feems to mean what is in our time expreffed by to come down, to pay liberally and readily. These accidental and colloquial fenfes are the difgrace of language, and the plague of commentators. JOHNSON.

To come off, is, to pay. In this fenfe it is ufed by Matfinger, in The Unnatural Combat, act IV. fc. ii. where a wench, demanding money of the father to keep his baftard, fays: "Will you come off, fir "Again, in Decker's If this be not a good Play the Devil is in it,

1612:

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"Do not your gallants come off roundly then?" Again, in Heywood's If you know not me you know Nobody, 1632, and then if he will not come off, carry him to the compter." Again, in A Trick to catch the Old One, 16:6: "Hark in thine ear-will he come off think'it thou, and pay my debts?"

Again, in the Return from Parnaffus, 1606:

"It is his meaning I fhould come off."

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Enter Page, Ford, Mrs. Page, Mrs. Ford, and Sir Hugh Evans.

Eva. 'Tis one of the best difcretions of a 'omans as ever I did look upon.

Page. And did he send you both these letters at an inftant?

Mrs. Page. Within a quarter of an hour.

Ford. Pardon me, wife: Henceforth do what thou

wilt;

3 I rather will fufpect the fun with cold,

Than

Again, in The Widow, by B. Jonfon, Fletcher, and Middleton, 1652: "I am forty dollars better for that: an 'twould come off quicker 'twere nere a whit the worfe for me." Again, in A merye Feft of a Man called Howleglas, bl. 1. no date: "Therefore come off lightly, and geve me my mony. STEEVENS.

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They must come off, fays mine hoft; I'll fauce them." This paffage has exercised the critics. It is altered by Dr. Warburton; but there is no corruption, and Mr. Steevens has rightly interpreted it. The quotation however from Malfinger, which is referred to likewife by Mr. Edwards in his Canons of Criticifm, fcarcely fatisfied Mr. Heath, and still lefs the last editor, who gives us," They must not come off." It is ftrange that any one converfant in old language, should hesitate at this phrafe. Take another quotation or two, that the difficulty may be effectually removed for the fuIn John Heywood's play of the Four P's, the pedlar fays: "If you be willing to buy,

ture.

"Lay down money, come of quickly."

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except

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In The Widow, by Jonion, Fletcher, and Middleton, “if he will come off roundly, he'll fet him free too." And, again, in Fennor's Comptor's Commonwealth: I would come off roundly, I fhould be bar'd of that priviledge," &c. FARMER. The phrafe is ufed by Chaucer, Friar's Tale, 338. edit. Urry: Come off, and let me riden haftily,

"Give me twelve pence; I may no longer tarie." TYRWHITT.

3 I rather will fufpect the fun with cold,] Thus the modern ediThe old ones read-with gold, which may mean, I ra

tions.

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ther

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